drug

Cheap drug boon for treating heart attack patients

An early treatment of heart-attack patients with a cheap drug holds promise to reduce health care expenditure to a great extent, researchers hope.

A six-month follow-up data of a trial showed that patients who received this treatment during emergency transit to hospital had much smaller amounts of dead heart muscle than those randomly assigned to receive no treatment.

The proportion of patients with a severely deteriorated heart contractile function is much less (60 percent) in the group that received the cheap drug named metoprolol.

“Early treatment with metoprolol also significantly reduced the rate of hospital readmission for chronic heart failure, and massively reduced the need to implant a cardioverter-defibrillator,” said lead investigator Borja Ibanez, a cardiologist at the Hospital Clinico San Carlos in Spain.

The possibility to reduce so dramatically the number of cases of chronic heart failure with such a cheap procedure could generate enormous savings for health services, Ibanez from CNIC (Spanish national cardiovascular research centre) noted.

This is one of the first studies to reveal extraordinary benefits from very early intervention -in this case with metoprolol – during the first contact with the emergency medical services.

An initial estimate indicates that if half the heart-attack patients in Europe received early treatment with this cheap drug, the savings in treatment for heart failure alone could exceed ?10 billion a year.

The study was published in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

Source: business standard

FDA Approves Drug for Older Women Experiencing Painful Sex

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved a new drug to treat postmenopausal women who experience pain during sex, the agency announced Tuesday.

The drug Osphena (ospemifene) mimics the effects of estrogen on vaginal tissue, which can become thinner, drier and more fragile from menopause. The pill, taken with food once a day, makes vaginal tissue thicker and less fragile to reduce pain during sex (called dyspareunia).

“Dyspareunia is among the problems most frequently reported by postmenopausal women,” said Dr. Victoria Kusiak, deputy director of the Office of Drug Evaluation III in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, in an FDA news release. “Osphena provides an additional treatment option for women seeking relief.”

The safety and effectiveness of Osphena was established in three clinical studies involving nearly 1,900 postmenopausal women with signs of vulvar and vaginal atrophy, or thinning and fragile vaginal tissue.

Women were randomly assigned take either Osphena or a placebo. In the first two studies, those who took the drug for 12 weeks experienced significantly less pain during sex than the women in the placebo group.

Although a third study on Osphena found the drug is safe for long-term use, the FDA noted that the drug should be prescribed for the shortest duration needed.

Osphena can cause the lining of the uterus to thicken, which is abnormal for postmenopausal women, the FDA cautioned. Women should seek medical attention right away if they experience unusual bleeding since it could be a warning sign of uterine cancer.

The new drug can also increase women’s risk for stroke and deep vein thrombosis, but not as much as estrogen-alone therapy, the FDA advised. Other possible Osphena side effects include hot flashes, vaginal discharge, muscle spasms, genital discharge and excessive sweating.

Source: health

 

Think twice before giving your child paracetamol!

A new study has found that paracetamol can interfere with the brain development of children, and can even be dangerous for unborn kids.

Researchers at Uppsala University examined paracetamol, one of the most commonly used drugs for pain and fever in children, by giving small doses of it to ten-day-old mice. They later carried out tests on the behavioral habits of the mice in adulthood.

They found that the mice could be hyperactive in adulthood, could display behavioural disturbances, and could have lower memory capability compared to the mice that weren’t given the dose, the Local reported.

Researchers said that the exposure to and presence of paracetamol during a critical period of brain development can induce long-lasting effects on cognitive function and alter the adult response to paracetamol in mice.

They added that parents should be careful in administering the drug. (Read: Why you don’t need medicine every time you have slight fever)

Researcher Henrik Viberg told the Upsala Nya Tidning newspaper that this shows that there are reasons to restrict the use of paracetamol at the end of pregnancy and to hold back from giving the medicine to infants.

The study was published in the online Toxicological Sciences journal.

So when should I take antipyretics like Paracetamol?

Fever up to 38 degree (102° F) might be considered as a safe, beneficial level that should not be interfered with antipyretics every time. Antipyretics should be used only when the temperature of the body is raised high enough to cause discomfort. In general, body temperature between 102° F and 104°F may cause uneasiness, so it’s better to bring it up to or below 102° F. Fever that rises above 104° F is definitely harmful and should be reduced with quick action. (Read: Apollo Hospitals launches fever clinic to tackle recurring, unknown fevers)

Adverse effects

The use of antipyretics to reduce fever is still controversial. Since all the available anitipyretics are pretty effective in managing fever, safety should be the main criteria while taking them. Common side-effects of frequent use of antipyretics include nausea, vomiting, stomach ache, breathing difficulties and headache. (Read: Painkillers or analgesics: Side-effects and precautions)

Most adverse effects due to antipyretics are a result of overdose (due to ignorance and negligence). Most of them have been cited in western literature and therefore may differ from Indian population. Overdose of paracetamol use has shown to cause liver toxicity and may also have an effect on circadian rhythm in healthy individuals. Ibuprofen is may lead to digestive disorders and, rarely, gastrointestinal bleeding. Kidney insufficiency and gastritis are also known adverse effects of antipyretics. (Read: Ibuprofen — why you shouldn’t pop these pills indiscriminately)

To summarize, antipyretics should not be used to bring down fever completely. The use of antipyretics should be limited just for symptomatic relief and to ensure that it is not raised to a dangerous level. Most of the times people also use antipyretics when there is minimal fever or to prevent fever from recurring. However, there is no evidence suggesting that antipyretics prevent fever from recurring. Also, half of times the dosage taken is incorrect. With this the chances of toxicity and adverse effects increase. Therefore, it is better to check the labels before taking an antipyretic drug and think about the long term complications you might have to face.

source: newsr

New breakthrough brings Muscular Dystrophy Defect drug closer to reality

Researchers have revealed an atomic-level view of a genetic defect that causes a form of muscular dystrophy, myotonic dystrophy type 2.

The scientists from The Scripps Research Institute have used this information to design drug candidates with potential to counter those defects and reverse the disease.

“This the first time the structure of the RNA defect that causes this disease has been determined,” lead author Matthew Disney said. “Based on these results, we designed compounds that, even in small amounts, significantly improve disease-associated defects in treated cells.”

Myotonic dystrophy type 2 is a relatively rare form of muscular dystrophy that is somewhat milder than myotonic dystrophy type 1, the most common adult-onset form of the disease.

Both types of myotonic dystrophy are inherited disorders that involve progressive muscle wasting and weakness, and both are caused by a type of genetic defect known as a “RNA repeat expansion,” a series of nucleotides repeated more times than normal in an individual’s genetic code.

The repeat binds to the protein MBNL1, rendering it inactive and resulting in RNA splicing abnormalities-which lead to the disease.
Using information about the RNA’s structure and movement, the scientists were able to design molecules to improve RNA function.

The new findings were confirmed using sophisticated computational models that show precisely how the small molecules interact with and alter the RNA structure over time.
Those predictive models matched what the scientists found in the study-that these new compounds bind to the repeat structure in a predictable and easily reproducible way, attacking the cause of the disease.

The study is published in journal ACS Chemical Biology. (ANI)

Source: Yahoo news